


Once Upon a Time

by kookykoi



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Spoilers, Gen, No Romance, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), i have no idea how to tag this, outpouring of feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-16
Updated: 2016-05-16
Packaged: 2018-06-08 20:11:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6871594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kookykoi/pseuds/kookykoi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once upon a time, Natasha Romanov didn’t work as part of a team. She worked alone and it was better that way. That version of Natasha Romanov no longer existed it seemed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Once Upon a Time

**Author's Note:**

> I had a lot of feels left over from seeing Civil War again and this happened.
> 
> This contains spoilers for Captain America: Civil War so if you haven't seen the movie yet, don't read this fic because spoilers!
> 
> Thank you to @redshield for reading this through before I posted it.

“This is Hill.” Maria’s voice was terse, her words clipped and straight to the point.

“It’s me,” was all Natasha said.

“Wondered if you were going to call. Do you need anything?”

“An update.” Hill was silent on the other end of the line for a moment. She was either gathering her thoughts or making sure she was alone.

“Stark and Rhodes are at the Compound with Vision. The others are in the wind. We’re looking for them.” Hill put extra emphasis on the last sentence, giving Natasha the impression she was included in that search.

“Anything else I need to know?” They had been on the call for twenty seconds now. Ten more and Natasha would have to end the call to prevent potential tracers finding her.

“Nothing I can say over this line,” Hill said and Natasha caught what she thought was regret in the other woman’s tone.

“Stay safe,” Natasha said finally.

“You too, Agent.” Hill ended the call, right on the 29th second mark. 

***

Natasha hadn’t learned anything new from the call and if anything, it only caused her more frustration about her current situation. But there was small comfort to be found from speaking to Hill. Hearing the other woman’s voice had managed to ground Natasha and prevent her from getting uncharacteristically carried away with her own emotions. Natasha was beginning to think a little more clearly which was, frankly, a relief.

Jesus, this wasn’t like her. She was a survivor and a fighter. She wasn’t supposed to be so dependent on others for validation. She wasn’t supposed to get so attached that it pained her when she missed them. And yet.

She found herself thinking about the Compound, about training with the others, about spending down time with the others, laughing with them. She had been led to believe that being a part of a team was for the greater good and now she was sitting in a safe house, pondering the point of it all. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

***

One week later, Natasha had left her safe house and gone to Hill’s apartment. She knew out of all the abodes of her former fellow agents, Hill’s would be the safest. Even so, Natasha swept the place for bugs before allowing herself to settle. Well, settle as much as an ex-assassin/spy could in her apartment that wasn’t hers.

Hill didn’t seem completely surprised to find Natasha sitting in her living room, watching re-runs of Dog Cops. 

“I have over 200 channels and you choose to watch that trash,” Hill stated coolly as she kicked off her heels and sat next to Natasha on the couch.

“It’s a classic,” Natasha retorted back, a faint smirk detectable on her features. 

Hill leaned back and slouched against the back of the couch. A comfortable silence fell between the two women and Natasha was grateful for that. 

“They still haven’t found Rogers,” Maria said after a time.

“I know.” Natasha had been trying to track the former patriotic icon but since he dropped the shield, he had suddenly become very hard to find.

“Do you know where he is?”

“I wish I did.” Natasha suddenly found that she couldn’t concentrate on the TV screen any more. She looked down at the floor, acting as if the carpet was the most fascinating thing she had ever seen. She felt the weight of the couch shift as Maria pulled herself forward. Out of the corner of Natasha’s vision, she saw that Maria was mirroring her body language.

“You can stay the night if you need to. Although if you do, you need to have a shower. You stink.”

Natasha laughed until her sides hurt and tears stung her eyes.

***

It was another four weeks before Natasha got close to finding Rogers. She thought she saw him through a crowd of people during rush-hour. He had a cap on, pulled down low over his face, but it wasn’t that she recognised through the crush of people. It was how he held himself. 

His shoulders set as if he was focused and determined (when was he not like that?). He moved almost seamlessly through the crowd and Natasha felt pride bloom inside of her. 

He wasn’t running, he was walking, just like she taught him. 

Before she could catch up with him, he managed to disappear. Natasha cursed something obscene in Russian. At least he was alive and in one piece. 

***

Natasha changed tact. Instead of finding Rogers, she went looking for Barton instead. Perhaps that’s how she should have started but it was too late to do anything about that now. Rogers didn’t want to be found, not even by her. She tried not to feel too dejected about that.

***

“‘Bout time you showed your face,” Barton drawled as he held onto her tightly. Natasha usually disliked his over-bearing hugs; this time she welcomed it.

“Everyone’s OK?” She asked, her voice muffled since her face was buried somewhere in his shoulder.

“OK as they’ve ever be.”

The Bartons weren’t on their farm any more. Laura and the kids had been stashed away somewhere with Laura’s family. Barton knew where. Natasha wasn’t going to ask.

“What about you? You OK? How you holding up?” Barton broke their hug and held Natasha out at arm’s length by her shoulders. The intensity of his glare made Natasha fidget. She could face the worst of the worst interrogators without breaking a sweat but Barton knew how to make her squirm.

“I don’t know.” An honest answer. There was no hiding behind duplicity or lies now since there was no point.

“What can I do?” Barton’s expression was softer than usual, like when he was talking with one of his kids and suddenly Natasha was overcome. 

“I don’t know.” Another honest answer, with the uninvited accompaniment of tears. Before the first tear could fall, Barton crushed her with another of his hugs.

***

“We can’t hide forever.”

“Don’t see why not,” Barton said with a characteristic shrug of his shoulders. “Kinda like it out here. No one’s giving us orders, no one’s shooting at us. Kinda peaceful. Don’t we deserve peaceful?”

“What about Laura and the kids?” That was enough to make Barton look uncomfortable.

“Alright. But it’s not like we can rock up to the Compound and be like: ‘hey, did you miss us?’”

“Why not?”

“Because we’ll get arrested and thrown back into the Raft. It ain’t pretty down there, Nat. And it’s boring. So boring. You know I don’t like boring.”

Natasha sighed and poked half-heartedly at her burger and fries. They had managed to find one of the very few diners in the country that had no idea who they were.

“You know surprises me?” Barton’s voice prompted Natasha to look up.

“What?”

“The fact you’ve stuck around this long.” Barton took a bite of his burger and chewed. Natasha stared at him. “Normally you would’ve hit the road by now. Using another cover, doing your badass spy thing.”

“Badass spy thing?”

“You know what I mean. It’s not like you to stay in one place for long and here you are, sticking to my side like glue. Normally it’s the other way around. What changed?”

Natasha stared down at her food. She wasn’t hungry any more. She pushed the plate away from herself and suppressed the urge to laugh as Barton helped himself to her fries.

“Even when we were with SHIELD, you didn’t stick around.”

“I know.”

“What changed?”

“What do you think?”

Barton stayed quiet, save for the sounds of his chewing. She could actually feel the weight of his stare on her.

“I’ve never been part of a team like that before.” She didn’t look up to match his gaze. Instead she stared at their plates. “I’ve always kept myself a part but you can’t on a team like that. You can’t. And I got attached. And I thought I was making the right decisions but now- now we’re in hiding and so is more than half of the team and I don’t know how to fix it.”

“Maybe you’re not the one to fix it.” Natasha wanted to punch Barton for sounding so nonchalant.

“Who else is going to fix it?”

“Maybe it shouldn’t be fixed?”

Natasha fell silent as she became surprisingly angry. The Avengers were never perfect, but they had been the closest to something she would equate to being her family. And now her family was broken and Barton was telling her that perhaps it should stay broken.

“I don’t believe that.”

“What do you believe?”

Again Natasha fell silent. She grabbed a napkin and tore it into tiny but neat pieces, all of which were the same size once she was done with them.

“I believe I need to find the others and bash all of their heads together.”

Barton chuckled. “Still don’t think that’s your problem.”

“Maybe it should be.”

“Meaning?”

Natasha sighed and cleared up all of her napkin pieces. She put them on her discarded plate before crossing her arms and leaning them on the table. She finally looked Clint in the eye.

“Once upon a time, I didn’t work as part of a team. I worked alone and it was better that way. At most, I worked with one other agent,” she waved her hand towards Barton who nodded back at her, “but that was it. Then the Avengers happened and now that version of me no longer exists it seems. I thought she did, I hoped she did, but she doesn’t.” Natasha paused, a frown etched deep on her features. Barton stared back at her, his face blank until he spoke again.

“Avengers assemble,” he said with a smirk.

“Yeah,” Natasha huffed out a laugh, “Avengers assemble.”


End file.
